Phosphene Dream

With an intense, brooding sound, Phosphene Dream is the perfect album for those who want to take a trip to the dark side.

A recent appearance on Late Show with David Letterman saw the band add an extra minute of soaring harmonies, leading to a satisfying end. It's a minor gripe, especially when Phosphene Dream is such a delight; but the addition of this finish on the album version of the song might have just about made it perfect.

Inasmuch as they continue to build upon The Velvet Underground's Warhol-ian art rock daze and the psychedelic blues of hometown heroes The 13th Floor Elevators, The Black Angels attempt clarity with Phosphene Dream, revelatory guitar playing that owes more of itself to the garage gems associated with The Kinks, The Monks, The Troggs and even The Doors.

Phosphene Dream is not a release to sing along to so much as lie helpless with whilst narratives spawn and play out in your imagination, invariably twisted and terrifying but always interesting. Psychological trauma might not necessarily be what you what you want from an album, but at least it provokes a response.

Phosphene Dream, count backward from 99.

By showing a willingness to diversify their sound while cutting down on bloat, Phosphene Dream is easily the Black Angels most listenable record to date. It also suggests that they're keen on that most outmoded of concepts in the blog era: career longevity.

While Phosphene Dream is certainly their most song-oriented release to date, it still too often emphasizes mood and texture over structure and tune.

Phosphene Dream is a step up, if only for the little bit of variety that the tighter arrangements and genre-hopping provide.

Even at Phosphene Dream's best moments, you can't help feeling that this is a very competent, earnest reproduction of things that have already been done.

There's a definite identity to the band on this third album, and its highest points are some of the highest of the band's career thus far, but to this listener, the band lack the kind of killer edge displayed by newer challengers to the retro-rock throne, such as San Francisco's Wooden Shjips. That said, if you like the influences clearly on display, there's little to fault, and plenty of fuzzy swagger to bask in.

Sorta silly lyrics like "Rollin' fast down I-35/Supersonic overdrive" indicate the road that Phosphene Dream navigates: It's all blacktop stretching through reverberating vistas--ultracool if a little predictable.

Sometimes being bad can be more fun than being good, and on Phosphene Dream The Black Angels hit that sweet spot more often than not.

It's not all zonked heaviness: There are smartly layered riffs and echo-slathered melodies.

It's what Spiritualized might sound like before Jason Pierce sprinkles his gospel fairy dust on them. [Oct 2010, p.104]

Everything from the production to the songwriting seems aimed to evoke the 60s, and the album would probably sound killer on a good turntable.

With Phosphene Dream, The Black Angels can seem like they're too often pulling in two directions at once -- unable to leave behind their bearings yet subtly alluding to a desire to move forward. [Fall 2010, p. 66]

The Austin Doors ramp up the psych-pop tunes. [Oct. 2010, p. 97]

A spring creeps into the step of "Sunday Afternoon" and "Telephone," providing a welcome break in the weather from a band who conform a little too readily to Henry Ford's dictum of having any colour you like so ling as it's black. [Oct 2010, p.87]

Their fourth album has none of the witchy class that makes these others so compelling and comes off like a painfully hokey play-act.

Phosphene Dream's real achievement is that it takes the band's earlier murderous attitude and makes it impossibly bland. It might be the first time you fall asleep during an album with copious references to toxic gas, hauntings, death, blood, and killing.